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I very much doubt many of these seeds will be successful. They say that it's more efficient to use a drone than to manually plant a tree or seed. Yes, blastin

I very much doubt many of these seeds will be successful. They say that it's more efficient to use a drone than to manually plant a tree or seed. Yes, blasting seeds out of a potato cannon would also be much more efficient if the goal is to spread unsuccessful seeds. If the goal is to get to a mature tree or forest, then I doubt it's more efficient at all. Forrests are self-sustaining. But recreating a clear-cut forrest usually requires a bit more care than just chucking seeds around.

colechristensen 4y ago
It’s fine if they’re not, trees produce ridiculous numbers of seeds per individual and if only a few are successful nature will take care of the rest. The problem is that monoculture forests aren’t actually all that great, better than nothing but not that great either.
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  To me it seems like if you only need a few to be successful then doing it manually will be just as effective (since you're doing it manually, your success rate will be much higher). In either case, it doesn't bode well for this startup's claimed goal. I'm sure their bank account on the other hand will be fine though.
  - FrenchDevRemote 4y ago
    it's probably cheaper/easier to send drones with lots of seeds over miles of land rather than workers with a few seeds
    - patmcc 4y ago
      Workers don't plant seeds, they plant seedlings (that are 2-4 years old, depending on species). You get a much higher survival rate that way. It's costly, but so far it's the most efficient way. Maybe drones will change that eventually, but I doubt it'll do it by firing seeds.
      - colechristensen 4y ago
        You can probably take a drone with a load of seeds much easier to remote areas than shipping large numbers of few year old trees.
        patmcc 4y ago
        Areas that are too remote aren't typically the ones that get deforested though - generally trees are removed either because they're valuable (and if you can bring trees out, you can bring seedlings in) or because the land is wanted (which usually means it's accessible). It's neat technology, and I hope they succeed, I just worry it's a cheap way to say "we're planting thousands of trees" while doing very little of value.
ChuckNorris89 4y ago
Yeah, I also doubt their claims. Spreading seeds from the air you're basically spreading bird food. Successful trees need the seeds to be planted under the earth. Lockheed Martin had a plan to make baby tree missiles to be dropped from the sky [1] and they'll embed themselves nicely into the earth thanks to the terminal velocity energy. Trouble is, they'll also probably kill all animals in the forest they happen to impale on their way down. [1] https://www.sunnyskyz.com/blog/1467/Planes-Can-Plant-1-Billion-Trees-A-Year-With-Seed-Bombs https://www.sunnyskyz.com/blog/1467/Planes-Can-Plant-1-Billi...
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  > Trouble is they'll also probably kill all animals in the forest they happen to impale on their way down. Is this actually that big of a deal? Unless they're literally carpet-bombing the place I'd expect the collateral damage to be minimal. I guess you can also adjust the schedule of the operation at times where the most common animals in the target area aren't active and are unlikely to be out in the line of fire.
  - ChuckNorris89 4y ago
    What if people happen to be wondering there during the tree bombing campaign? I doubt human casualties or even injuries are acceptable.
    - xyzzyz 4y ago
      Why would you some crazy aerial methods in locations where humans can casually stroll? The entire point here is to do it in unreachable places.
      - Nextgrid 4y ago
        When it comes to human casualties, “unreachable places” probably won’t cut it. You’ll need to be 100% sure there are no humans in there at all, short of maybe uncontacted/unknown hominid species. A potential solution would be to announce the operation months/years in advance and actively prohibit access to the areas during that time.
xg15 4y ago
I mean, they at least claim that solving this problem constitutes the actual secret sauce of their project: > "The niche really lies in our biotech, which is the support system for the seed once it's on the ground," says Walker. “It protects the seed from different types of wildlife, but also supports the seed once it germinates and really helps deliver all of those nutrients and mineral sources that it needs, along with some probiotics to really boost early-stage growth." No idea how credible this is of course.
- dymk 4y ago
  It’s not credible. I know people that work at this kind of company. None of the countermeasures have been successful and the germination rate is less than 1%.
  - relaunched 4y ago
    Can you site any sources supporting your claim?
    - dymk 4y ago
      No, this is hearsay, and I'm only passing on information I've heard from people that work at companies in this space and in silviculture (lots of companies are trying to crack the "plant trees with drones" nut).
  - na85 4y ago
    Even 0.5% of 40000 seeds is 200 trees per day.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - dymk 4y ago
      That's nothing, and in addition to that, it's a huge waste of seeds (these companies are buying up all the available seed for certain species of trees, which means net fewer trees planted). Manually planting already germinated baby trees is more efficient both in terms of hours and labor spent and has a higher germination rate.
moltar 4y ago
Likewise I doubt it. I had a friend who was doing tree planting during the summers back in the college days. They were planting tree saplings, and even then many did not survive. It’s a numbers game. However, this is a difficult and expensive solution. If they can spread lots of seeds on the cheap and get results then more power to them!
hosh 4y ago
I don’t know about a forest, but seed bombing is something that guerrilla gardners have used to reintroduce native plants back into blighted urban areas. Reforestation projects that I have heard work well, works with ecological succession. Once clear cut, if grass gets into there, then that’s more difficult because soil ecology has changed to favor grasses. But dumping a bunch of mulch will favor forest soil and favorable conditions for a forest. Mulch from cut trees usually go to the landfill, with arborists having to pay for it. More fundamental ways are changing the way water flows through a system. Water just needs to be slowed down enough to accumulate organic materials. This video is about how the Arizona canal inadvertently created a water-harvesting structure that kicked off native wild growth along the bearm: https://youtu.be/jf8usAesJvo https://youtu.be/jf8usAesJvo
- UncleEntity 4y ago
  I’ve read where they study reforestation and it’s a whole process where ‘pioneer species’ pave the way to ‘proper’ forest plants. Probably read about it in the Humbolt State Alumni magazine since they clear-cut the hell out of the redwoods in the ‘80s and HSU has* a really good forestry department that studies these sorts of things. * had? They’re now a ‘polytechnic’ so don’t know what to call them anymore — Cal Poly Humboldt maybe?
dqpb 4y ago
How were the first forests made?
- Maursault 4y ago
  > How were the first forests made? In a few minutes, you can find out by watching episode 3 of Life on Earth: The First Forests[1] from time index 20:41, linked here: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2i44t3?start=1241 https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2i44t3?start=1241 [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0846516/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0846516/
dataflow 4y ago
> I very much doubt many of these seeds will be successful. Isn't that the entire point of using a ton of seeds? It's cheap and you only need N of them to sprout, so you just try to plant as many as you need to reach N viable ones. Seems like a weird way to dismiss the approach.
- timeon 4y ago
  Spray and pray. That is what plants are doing.
junon 4y ago
Have you researched at all or are you just dismissing the entirety of their work? Did you know they plan for an efficacy rate and over-seed? There's no downside. They've thought about all of this before.
- BigBubbleButt 4y ago
  Have you researched at all or are you just assuming the entirety of their claims? Did you know they lie about their efficacy rate? There's no upside. They've thought about nothing but how to make money from carbon credits.
  - junon 4y ago
    That's a bold claim. Care to elaborate how you came to this conclusion?
    - BigBubbleButt 4y ago
      I spent 5 minutes researching. Hell, you could just get the information from other comments if you're too lazy to do that.
hemreldop 4y ago
hirundo 4y ago
If there are chipmunks or squirrels the job is done on arrival. Those little guys are outrageously industrious at burying excess seeds and nuts, everywhere they can. I'll betcha order Rodentia is responsible for planting many times more trees than Primates. We should bioengineer them for our future teraforming jobs.
- Handytinge 4y ago
  There are no chipmunks or squirrels in Australia.
cbHXBY1D 4y ago
I think that's why the Seattle company Droneseed is focusing on more established saplings: https://droneseed.com/ https://droneseed.com/
l33tbro 4y ago
A company I've done work for has an 80 percent germination rate by shooting seedballs into the dirt. They later return to the site via GPS data to monitor and verify their success. https://dronedj.com/2022/01/07/airseed-technologies-works-to-plant-100-million-trees-by-drones/ https://dronedj.com/2022/01/07/airseed-technologies-works-to...
Proven 4y ago

colechristensen 4y ago

It’s fine if they’re not, trees produce ridiculous numbers of seeds per individual and if only a few are successful nature will take care of the rest. The problem is that monoculture forests aren’t actually all that great, better than nothing but not that great either.

Nextgrid 4y ago
To me it seems like if you only need a few to be successful then doing it manually will be just as effective (since you're doing it manually, your success rate will be much higher). In either case, it doesn't bode well for this startup's claimed goal. I'm sure their bank account on the other hand will be fine though.
- FrenchDevRemote 4y ago
  it's probably cheaper/easier to send drones with lots of seeds over miles of land rather than workers with a few seeds
  - patmcc 4y ago
    Workers don't plant seeds, they plant seedlings (that are 2-4 years old, depending on species). You get a much higher survival rate that way. It's costly, but so far it's the most efficient way. Maybe drones will change that eventually, but I doubt it'll do it by firing seeds.
    - colechristensen 4y ago
      You can probably take a drone with a load of seeds much easier to remote areas than shipping large numbers of few year old trees.
      - patmcc 4y ago
        Areas that are too remote aren't typically the ones that get deforested though - generally trees are removed either because they're valuable (and if you can bring trees out, you can bring seedlings in) or because the land is wanted (which usually means it's accessible). It's neat technology, and I hope they succeed, I just worry it's a cheap way to say "we're planting thousands of trees" while doing very little of value.

ChuckNorris89 4y ago

Yeah, I also doubt their claims. Spreading seeds from the air you're basically spreading bird food. Successful trees need the seeds to be planted under the earth. Lockheed Martin had a plan to make baby tree missiles to be dropped from the sky [1] and they'll embed themselves nicely into the earth thanks to the terminal velocity energy. Trouble is, they'll also probably kill all animals in the forest they happen to impale on their way down. [1] https://www.sunnyskyz.com/blog/1467/Planes-Can-Plant-1-Billion-Trees-A-Year-With-Seed-Bombs https://www.sunnyskyz.com/blog/1467/Planes-Can-Plant-1-Billi...

Nextgrid 4y ago
> Trouble is they'll also probably kill all animals in the forest they happen to impale on their way down. Is this actually that big of a deal? Unless they're literally carpet-bombing the place I'd expect the collateral damage to be minimal. I guess you can also adjust the schedule of the operation at times where the most common animals in the target area aren't active and are unlikely to be out in the line of fire.
- ChuckNorris89 4y ago
  What if people happen to be wondering there during the tree bombing campaign? I doubt human casualties or even injuries are acceptable.
  - xyzzyz 4y ago
    Why would you some crazy aerial methods in locations where humans can casually stroll? The entire point here is to do it in unreachable places.
    - Nextgrid 4y ago
      When it comes to human casualties, “unreachable places” probably won’t cut it. You’ll need to be 100% sure there are no humans in there at all, short of maybe uncontacted/unknown hominid species. A potential solution would be to announce the operation months/years in advance and actively prohibit access to the areas during that time.

xg15 4y ago

I mean, they at least claim that solving this problem constitutes the actual secret sauce of their project: > "The niche really lies in our biotech, which is the support system for the seed once it's on the ground," says Walker. “It protects the seed from different types of wildlife, but also supports the seed once it germinates and really helps deliver all of those nutrients and mineral sources that it needs, along with some probiotics to really boost early-stage growth." No idea how credible this is of course.

dymk 4y ago
It’s not credible. I know people that work at this kind of company. None of the countermeasures have been successful and the germination rate is less than 1%.
- relaunched 4y ago
  Can you site any sources supporting your claim?
  - dymk 4y ago
    No, this is hearsay, and I'm only passing on information I've heard from people that work at companies in this space and in silviculture (lots of companies are trying to crack the "plant trees with drones" nut).
- na85 4y ago
  Even 0.5% of 40000 seeds is 200 trees per day.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - dymk 4y ago
    That's nothing, and in addition to that, it's a huge waste of seeds (these companies are buying up all the available seed for certain species of trees, which means net fewer trees planted). Manually planting already germinated baby trees is more efficient both in terms of hours and labor spent and has a higher germination rate.

moltar 4y ago

Likewise I doubt it. I had a friend who was doing tree planting during the summers back in the college days. They were planting tree saplings, and even then many did not survive. It’s a numbers game. However, this is a difficult and expensive solution. If they can spread lots of seeds on the cheap and get results then more power to them!

hosh 4y ago

I don’t know about a forest, but seed bombing is something that guerrilla gardners have used to reintroduce native plants back into blighted urban areas. Reforestation projects that I have heard work well, works with ecological succession. Once clear cut, if grass gets into there, then that’s more difficult because soil ecology has changed to favor grasses. But dumping a bunch of mulch will favor forest soil and favorable conditions for a forest. Mulch from cut trees usually go to the landfill, with arborists having to pay for it. More fundamental ways are changing the way water flows through a system. Water just needs to be slowed down enough to accumulate organic materials. This video is about how the Arizona canal inadvertently created a water-harvesting structure that kicked off native wild growth along the bearm: https://youtu.be/jf8usAesJvo https://youtu.be/jf8usAesJvo

UncleEntity 4y ago
I’ve read where they study reforestation and it’s a whole process where ‘pioneer species’ pave the way to ‘proper’ forest plants. Probably read about it in the Humbolt State Alumni magazine since they clear-cut the hell out of the redwoods in the ‘80s and HSU has* a really good forestry department that studies these sorts of things. * had? They’re now a ‘polytechnic’ so don’t know what to call them anymore — Cal Poly Humboldt maybe?

dqpb 4y ago

How were the first forests made?

Maursault 4y ago
> How were the first forests made? In a few minutes, you can find out by watching episode 3 of Life on Earth: The First Forests[1] from time index 20:41, linked here: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2i44t3?start=1241 https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2i44t3?start=1241 [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0846516/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0846516/

dataflow 4y ago

> I very much doubt many of these seeds will be successful. Isn't that the entire point of using a ton of seeds? It's cheap and you only need N of them to sprout, so you just try to plant as many as you need to reach N viable ones. Seems like a weird way to dismiss the approach.

timeon 4y ago
Spray and pray. That is what plants are doing.

junon 4y ago

Have you researched at all or are you just dismissing the entirety of their work? Did you know they plan for an efficacy rate and over-seed? There's no downside. They've thought about all of this before.

BigBubbleButt 4y ago
Have you researched at all or are you just assuming the entirety of their claims? Did you know they lie about their efficacy rate? There's no upside. They've thought about nothing but how to make money from carbon credits.
- junon 4y ago
  That's a bold claim. Care to elaborate how you came to this conclusion?
  - BigBubbleButt 4y ago
    I spent 5 minutes researching. Hell, you could just get the information from other comments if you're too lazy to do that.

hemreldop 4y ago

hirundo 4y ago

If there are chipmunks or squirrels the job is done on arrival. Those little guys are outrageously industrious at burying excess seeds and nuts, everywhere they can. I'll betcha order Rodentia is responsible for planting many times more trees than Primates. We should bioengineer them for our future teraforming jobs.

Handytinge 4y ago
There are no chipmunks or squirrels in Australia.

cbHXBY1D 4y ago

I think that's why the Seattle company Droneseed is focusing on more established saplings: https://droneseed.com/ https://droneseed.com/

l33tbro 4y ago

A company I've done work for has an 80 percent germination rate by shooting seedballs into the dirt. They later return to the site via GPS data to monitor and verify their success. https://dronedj.com/2022/01/07/airseed-technologies-works-to-plant-100-million-trees-by-drones/ https://dronedj.com/2022/01/07/airseed-technologies-works-to...

Proven 4y ago